The Red Oak Creek Covered Bridge’s longevity is nearly as astounding as the story of its builder, Horace King, part black, part white, part Catawba Indian—a man so far ahead of his time that he wore a soul patch 60 years before anyone heard of jazz.

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It doesn’t much matter what I think about Superica and The El Felix, Ford Fry’s two new Tex-Mex restaurants with almost identical menus and almost identical lines. When I asked the manager of The El Felix—in Avalon, the Alpharetta mall-city—how many diners they served, he said, “Three to four hundred on a slow night.”

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Style & Substance

How to decorate with summer's happiest hues, a Swedish midsummer celebration, where to shop on the Westside, Nancy Braithwaite on Coco Chanel, luxe life on the lake, an essay from Mary Kay Andrews, and much more in the summer issue of Atlanta Magazine's HOME.

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Southbound magazine, the newest ancillary title from the publishers of Atlanta magazine, showcases the top travel destinations in the Southeast. We visit idyllic small towns and exciting cities in search of outstanding vacation opportunities.Inside Southbound

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Georgia offers diverse places to see and things to do, from the mountains in North Georgia to the coasts of Savannah and The Golden Isles. Take a tour in your own backyard and visit all that our great state has to offer. Begin your tour

Dining in has its advantages: You can wear what you want, eat when you want, and drink as much as you like. To craft the perfect dinner party but skip dirtying the kitchen, look to these seven purveyors for the best meat, cheese, pasta, wine, and dessert.

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July 2015: Top Doctors

The list of doctors whom other doctors trust most. Plus, a roundtable of experts on the challenges of Alzheimer’s disease, and an Atlanta photographer documents his surgeon father’s struggle with dementia.

Meet The Roycrofters, Hard Rock Rising Atlanta winners

In the age of Autotune, roots rock trio is still crafting its sound by hand

Atlanta roots rock power trio The Roycrofters found one hell of a way to mark the band’s first anniversary last weekend — the act has been selected to represent the city of Atlanta in the Hard Rock Rising Global Battle of the Bands. Last Friday night, at the Hard Rock Café downtown in the local battle band finale, lead singer John Kalina, drummer Joseph Kalina and bassist Nick Carey blasted through a ridiculously tight 20-minute set of songs from the band’s eponymous debut album, captivating the crowd and the judges. “My goal was to find a band to send through who’s really going to represent Atlanta well,” explained judge and Ticket Alternative co-founder Iain Bluett. “For me, this is that band.”

Like the original Roycrofters, Elbert Hubbard’s early 20th century counter-culture band of crafts folk determined to keep artistry alive in the era of the industrial revolution, Joseph Kalina says his band is all about hard work. “Our parents raised us that way,” he tells Atlanta magazine. “We’re a very ‘do it yourself’ band. I’ve been playing in bands since I was 14 and every band I’ve been in has always felt like the underdog.”

The trio emerged a year ago from the remnants of the Atlanta jam band five-piece Sinsemelia with a stripped down, organic rock sound more reminiscent of Humble Pie and Led Zeppelin than Phish. The Roycrofters could be sonic siblings with another Atlanta act, Grammy winners The Black Keys.

And like another famous local band, The Roycrofters guitarist/lead singer and the trio’s drummer grew up listening and playing music together. “I like the brother dynamic in bands,” says Joseph. “You’ve got the Black Crowes, you’ve got Kings of Leon, you’ve got the Allman Bros. And sure, we occasionally get into stuff with each other but we get over it quickly because we’re family.”

The band’s serious work ethic also sets The Roycrofters apart in the Autotune era where most musicians their age (John is 22 and Joseph is 25) shirk the rigors of the road and practicing the art of live performance in favor of standing in line overnight to snag a wristband and instant fame from Ryan Seacrest.
“Like the artists and crafts people we named the band for, we really value things created by hand by individuals,” explains Joseph. “Music, like most things, shouldn’t be mass produced. Like the original Roycrofters, we’re about using our hands, our head and our heart to create our sound. As a band, it’s about keeping it human, keeping it us.”

To keep updated with The Roycrofters gig schedule, visit the band’s Facebook page.